


Stories of the Second Self: Fight or Flight

by John_Steiner



Series: Alter Idem [190]
Category: Urban Fantasy - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-21
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:21:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26027884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/John_Steiner/pseuds/John_Steiner
Summary: Unsettled by the seeming random death of another angel, Sariel Hayes scouts around the city to follow up on his case. She discovers that the killer is still on the hunt, and realizes who he actually is after.
Series: Alter Idem [190]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1618813





	Stories of the Second Self: Fight or Flight

When Sariel Hayes first met Samuel Engall his kindness and sympathy brought out a smile from her. Largely, because he misunderstood her recounting a run-in with her mother's pastor as being something traumatic, when at thirteen Sariel set the man straight with a solid kick to the groin.

Unsure what she was thinking, Sariel knew Samuel Engall's death called for justice and the cops were moving too slow. Or maybe they had the wrong perspective, Sariel thought as she glided over the city blocks and streets.

Far from the only angel cruising low over Cincinnati, Sariel sighted others flying at treetop and rooftop level. With a couple powerful air-whipping strokes Sariel's light-being wings pulled her upward as she momentarily sped up.

Someone had to have followed Samuel around before killing him. He and Sariel only dated a couple times, though things could've gotten serious but for his life being taken from him. It made Sariel wonder if the killer were going to stalk her now.

That realization had Sariel banking toward the streets around her apartment and workplace. Despite her altitude, Sariel's eagle-sharp vision offered keen details on cars and people. One person stood out.

It was the first time Sariel saw Tony Bent, her mother's pastor from above, but she knew it was him. He'd parked his car across the street from the Goodwin, Rosen, and Baker Law Firm she worked for as a paralegal in training.

Realizing he had been stalking her before that restaurant confrontation, Sariel's suspicions of him darkened. First, Tony Bent had goaded an old boyfriend to reach out to Sariel, and then he convinced Sariel's mother to call her after two years of silent treatment.

At the time Sariel hadn't put it together, but when Samuel was murdered and nothing of his taken, Sariel came to realize the motive was personal. Just that Sariel thought the animosity was toward Samuel himself not her.

Tony Bent didn't go into the law firm. No, he picked a bus stop out front to sit and pull something out to look at, his phone maybe. It was Sariel's day off, so she decided to circle overhead, often flying off and back again to see if he'd move. Flying wasn't effortless, and Sariel had to land, get a light snack, and fly back.

While Sariel and other angels didn't need tail feathers, other factors aerodynamics still governed her seemingly physics-defying wings. Like, for instance, when she slowed her body and legs angled down more to being almost vertical. It required assistance from her lateral obliques, muscles as developed as her pectorals and other core muscles, to continue stable wing beats. It was more tiring, though nowhere near as hard as stationary hovering.

Tony Bent finally gave up, or so it seemed to Sariel. Yet, when he went back to his car he drove around the block of her apartment complex and kept circling until sundown. For reasons beyond the normal nighttime affective disorder many angels experienced, Sariel wasn't going to fly at night. She drifted down in tight circles over a parking lot on the neighboring block and lightly touched down.

On foot, Sariel made her way back home, but she saw Tony Bent walking toward her building too. Hesitating outside the foyer, Sariel watched Tony head to the elevator, push a button and wait. Only after he got into the car and the doors closed, did Sariel go inside and went for the stairs. Rather than ascend one step at a time, Sariel threw herself up each set of stairs using a single partially-folded wing beat.

Once at her floor, Sariel peeked out from the stair well to watch Tony exit the elevator. It was frightening how Tony knew to walk straight to Sariel's door. Scarier still, was that Tony dropped to one knee and went to work on her door lock. He hadn't even tried disguising himself as maintenance or a locksmith called in by the management office.

Apparently, breaking and entering were new to Tony, because he struggled getting past the lock. Though, as Sariel watched, he did finally succeed and immediately went in and closed the door behind himself.

With everything else that happened, Sariel was sure what he was there for. It was time to settle up.

Making a show of getting her keys out, Sariel put the key in and unnecessarily turned the lock. Opening the door, she didn't see Tony in her living room. Sariel took off her fanny pack and tossed it on the couch. She made her steps to the bedroom casual, but Sariel rose her wings up in front of herself ready for whatever ambush was coming.

Due to some property of her feathers, Sariel was able to see through her wings with diffraction as though through glass. Sure enough, Sariel's close door blew open and Tony rushed her.

The first thing that got Sariel's attention was the utility knife in Tony's hand. He was middled-aged, but dyed hair wasn't the only youthful thing about him. Tony was able to tackle Sariel before she could set her feet, and they both fell to the floor with him atop her.

Through reddened face, Tony stabbed down with blinding rage. However, the knife tip hit Sariel's wing feathers with a rebound. He tried again, as Sariel kept her wings before her, as he tried working the blade around her feathers. A piercing pain shot from her wing hand, and Sariel threw the folded wrist of her other wing into his face.

Even reactive and poorly leveraged, Sariel's wing strike dazed Tony long enough that she could get the knife away from him. Sariel tucked her leg up and planted a heel to Tony's stomach to push him off along with her wing. Staggering to get on her feet, Sariel ran for her bedroom window, unlocked it, and slide it open to throw the knife out.

Turning to face Tony, Sariel saw that he had another bigger knife, this one definitely not for cutting at any job. With each slash and stab at her, Sariel answered using wing sweep and ducking back. However, Tony started grabbing random things to through at her.

Pulling the blanket off her bed, Tony threw that over Sariel's wings and managed to tangle her up. He then pinned her up against wall, and somewhere in the struggle Sariel felt the first stab into her stomach and a cut across her forearm.

In a shrill scream, Sariel thrashed and kicked trying to get her her hands on Tony's wrist, all the while unable to see with the blanket over her. She felt a burning cut spread diagonally from her lower chest and down the side of her waist. However, she at last seized his arm.

Though Sariel's grip wasn't super strong, it proved equal to that of the man attacking her. However, her chest muscles and, to a lesser degree, upper arms offered more than enough advantage to control Tony's struggling hold. At some point Sariel heard a break, but she was too panicked to know who's bone had broken.

One more full-body twist, and Sariel realize with Tony's screams replacing her own, that she'd broken his arm. Tony's hand was still wrapped around the knife handle, when Sariel thrust it up into the side of his neck so hard he briefly lifted off the floor. Tony fell onto Sariel's bed, one hand clutching the sheets, and the other grasping for his neck.

Backing up fearfully and holding her stomach, Sariel watched Tony turn over to reveal his wide eyes and mouth gaping like a fish out of water. Tony's huffs grew more rapid but also shallower with each desperate gulp, as blood rushed out of his neck in ever weaker pulses.

In shock, Sariel slid down her wall, still holding the wounds inflicted on her. She thought she heard commotion out by her front door, but no one immediately came in. It was several minutes later when a man and woman wearing uniforms came to her side.

"Miss," the woman said with an calm but firm tone, "I need you to take your hands off so I can stop the bleeding. Miss, move your hands."

Sariel complied, and saw how much of her own blood covered her hands. Stunned, she gazed at the two people helping her, seeing scalp hair growing from the sides of the woman's neck. The sound of bandage tape preceded a sense of something being pressed into the stab wound.

"This laceration is long, but shallow," the man said to the woman, who Sariel finally recognized as firefighters. Behind them stood a cop looking over Tony Bent who hadn't moved for several minutes.

Sariel felt chilly as the firefighters moved her onto a gurney and wheeled her to the elevator.

"How're you feeling?" the woman asked.

"Cold," Sariel replied absently.

"You're going to pull through, okay?" the woman assured, "I need you to stay awake. Can you do that?"

Sariel nodded, but then thought about Tony. "Is he gone?"

"The man we found?" the woman asked, and then added, "He expired."

Sariel's eyes closed as she heaved in relief.

"No, no," the woman said, "eye open. Don't go to sleep."

"M'kay," Sariel absently muttered.

"You got him," the woman alluded to her understanding of what happened. "It's over. You're safe. Nothing's going to happen to you."

"Thank you." Sariel laid her hand onto the woman firefighter's hold on her stomach wound.


End file.
